(2/2)
Lucky Cruise Ship
Chapter 567: You swear?
Inside the “Integrity First” livestream room, the screen plunged into darkness without warning. Nothing could be seen clearly; only the clinking of shackles, rapid and terrified panting, and the rustling of fabric could be heard.
[?]
[Why did the lights go out all of a sudden? What’s the situation?]
[I don’t know! Doesn’t the stream usually have night vision? Why can’t I see anything…]
[Now I can’t even hear anything! That is so weird!]
The darkness pressed down heavily on his body, clinging to every inch of skin like a fluid substance. A large, dry hand pressed against his lower abdomen; the cold palm lay flat against warm, trembling skin, groping as if to confirm something.
Clink.
The young man’s fingers gripped the other’s wrist, his voice deliberately lowered, sounding somewhat embarrassed:
“…Stop touching.”
“This matter, uh, is complicated to explain. In short, it’s all just a tactical necessity…”
Although the hand on his abdomen stopped, the other hand quickly landed on his neck. Cold fingertips slowly traced the heavy collar around his neck, rubbing against the skin reddened by the metal edge:
“And this?”
The voice beside his ear grew gloomier.
“Tactical necessity?”
Wen Jianyan: “…”
He opened his mouth to say something more, but the fingers on his neck tightened, forcing him to tilt his head back.
An aggressive kiss, one that almost suffocated him, pressed down.
Perhaps because of this bottomless, pitch-black darkness, his senses were infinitely amplified.
The darkness from all directions pressed down, feeling like sinking into a cold, soft, wet sponge. Every inch of exposed skin felt as if it were being caressed and sucked. The brand on his hip bone burned, and his lower abdomen arched reflexively, taut as a bowstring.
“Hey! Still… on the stream…”
Amidst the chaos, Wen Jianyan barely managed to squeeze out disjointed words from his throat.
“Don’t… you fucking… go crazy.”
He didn’t know how much time had passed before the kiss, which felt like it intended to devour him whole, finally stopped.
Wen Jianyan gasped for air. His vision was pitch black—he didn’t know if it was naturally this dark or if the dizziness from oxygen deprivation was blinding him. In the invisibility, he felt the pad of the other’s finger slowly wipe across the corner of his lips, brushing away the overflowing saliva.
“…It really was a tactical necessity.” Wen Jianyan caught his breath and backhandedly gripped the other’s wrist. “I didn’t lie to you.”
“…Really?” The other’s voice rang in his ear.
“Really, I swear.”
These words slipped out reflexively, but then Wen Jianyan suddenly felt something was off.
Wait? Why did he have to swear an oath?
“Then, from now on, only I am allowed to see you without clothes.” Without giving him time to think, the fingers on his abdomen began to move again. “And only I am allowed to touch you.”
Wen Jianyan shuddered and reflexively gripped the other’s wrist to stop him from doing anything else: “Okay, okay, okay!”
“You swear?”
“I swear!”
The darkness pressing on him finally withdrew, satisfied.
Wen Jianyan sat up. Although he still felt dizzy, he breathed a sigh of relief—thank god, he had finally placated him.
After all, in his current state, if Wu Zhu decided to do something right now, he truly had no ability to stop him.
He shook his head, tossing all chaotic thoughts out of his mind.
After a few deep breaths, Wen Jianyan finally regained his previous calm and rationality: “Anyway, the reason I pulled you in from the deck last night was for this very moment.”
Precisely because the auction would not allow such rule-breaking behavior, Wen Jianyan had taken the risk to go to the deck and seek Wu Zhu’s assistance.
“Mn.”
Wu Zhu said, “What do you want me to do?”
Wen Jianyan paused, seeming to want to say something, but held back. He simply raised his hand and shook the chains on his body:
“Can you get rid of these things?”
In the darkness, Wu Zhu’s fingers touched his neck again. This time, they landed on the chains and the eerie patterns inscribed on them. Even though they were separated by a heavy layer of cold metal and he didn’t touch Wen Jianyan’s skin at all, Wen Jianyan still shrank back involuntarily.
“…” After a long while, Wu Zhu spoke slowly, “No.”
As expected.
Wen Jianyan didn’t feel discouraged, but continued to ask: “Then, is the thing you’re looking for nearby?”
Although he didn’t know the specific floor number, he was currently in the negative levels of the cruise ship—and if Wen Jianyan remembered correctly, Wu Zhu had said before the instance even started that something he needed was down below.
Wu Zhu: “Not here.”
Wen Jianyan sighed. “Alright.” He knew nothing would be that simple.
“But this place… is a bit strange,” Wu Zhu suddenly said before Wen Jianyan could speak again.
Wen Jianyan was startled: “How so?”
“The Nightmare’s control over this place isn’t strong,” Wu Zhu said. “That is why I can make its surveillance temporarily blind right now.”
…Not strong?
Wen Jianyan froze.
That was indeed strange.
He had been to the B1 to B4 levels, as well as B7 to B9 of the Lucky Cruise ship. This meant the level he was currently on should be even deeper.
The deeper the level, the higher the Nightmare’s control should be.
“But when you were outside the instance, you couldn’t find a weak point, could you?” Wen Jianyan asked in confusion.
After all, if the Nightmare had such a spot within the instance, Wu Zhu should have been able to slip in long ago, without needing Wen Jianyan to risk bringing him in from the deck.
Wu Zhu: “Yes.”
Wen Jianyan frowned: “Then what’s going on?”
Wu Zhu: “I don’t know.”
Unsurprisingly, it was his consistent response of knowing nothing.
Wen Jianyan: “…”
Fine.
“Anyway, the plan now is to find a way out of this floor,” Wen Jianyan quickly rallied and continued calmly. “I plan to act tomorrow morning. If I still can’t find a way to leave, I’m afraid I’ll have to borrow your power.”
Although the Nightmare’s control wasn’t strong, out of caution, it was better for Wu Zhu to enter the enemy’s field of vision as late as possible. Unless absolutely necessary, Wen Jianyan didn’t want to use Wu Zhu’s power.
Wu Zhu: “Mn.”
“Before that, you’d better go back inside the ring,” Wen Jianyan said.
Wu Zhu: “Mn.”
“However, due to the shackles, I can’t actively activate the ring…” Wen Jianyan hesitated. “Maybe you come out once every two hours… no, make it one hour. It’s best not to attract too much attention.”
Wu Zhu: “Mn.”
Perhaps because his fur had been smoothed just now, he agreed to everything Wen Jianyan said, raising no objections to this blatant exploitation.
“Alright, I’m going to sleep,” Wen Jianyan said.
He opened his mouth: “You…”
Before finishing his sentence, Wen Jianyan fell silent again, seemingly struggling internally.
“Hm?” Wu Zhu asked.
He seemed to tilt his head in confusion. In the dark, Wen Jianyan could feel the other’s cold hair brushing against his arm.
He didn’t know if the light was too dim, obscuring his reason, or if the other party was too cooperative, making him forget his resistance… or if it was for some deeper reason.
“………………You can go back into the ring in the morning.”
Finally, he sighed and spoke slowly.
This night was exceptionally dark and heavy. Wen Jianyan didn’t dream at all. When he opened his eyes again, everything had returned to normal. He was lying in the cage covered with a quilt, and Wu Zhu was gone from his side—it seemed he had returned to the ring.
In the “Integrity First” live room:
[Ahhh, thank god, we can finally see the picture! It was worth clicking ‘complaint’ all night!]
[Seriously, last night the stream was clearly on, but we couldn’t see a single thing. It was so weird.]
[Maybe it’s some special mechanic of this floor? I don’t really get it…]
[Anyway, it’s good that the stream is back! And looking at the room, we shouldn’t have missed anything!!!]
There were no windows in the cabin, making it impossible to tell the time, but the overhead lights had long since come back on, illuminating the entire cabin as bright as day, making the conversation in the dark feel like a distant dream.
Wen Jianyan sat up. He shook his head, tossing out the lingering bits of strangeness.
Regardless, he needed to leave this floor before the auction ended tonight. That was the urgent priority; everything else had to wait.
Wen Jianyan climbed up and walked out of the cage.
He wolfed down the food and water, simply replenishing his energy, then picked up the box containing the [Dead Sea Scrolls] and walked out of the room.
The endless corridor, the tightly closed cabin doors on both sides—everything was no different from yesterday.
However, this time, Wen Jianyan didn’t walk forward like he did yesterday. He knew well that in this situation, continuing down the corridor was meaningless and would only lead to walking in circles. To break the deadlock, he had to take an unconventional path…
Thinking this, Wen Jianyan turned his head, his gaze landing on the tightly closed cabin door opposite him.
He hadn’t forgotten that last night, after the safe time ended, a sharp and urgent “thump, thump, thump” knocking sound had come from within that door, sounding hair-raising.
In the “Integrity First” live room:
[Wait a minute, the anchor’s look… is he thinking of going in?!]
[Huh? Has he forgotten that he can’t use any items right now? Is he crazy?]
Wen Jianyan wasn’t crazy.
Quite the opposite, he was very sober.
The more the auction didn’t want him to go somewhere, the more likely it was the correct path. The more dangerous a place was, the more likely a chance of survival existed there. Although he couldn’t use items now and had almost no means of survival, Wu Zhu’s presence gave him at least a bit of confidence—his adventure on the deck previously had finally paid off.
He reached out, placed his hand on the cabin door, and pressed down slightly—
The cabin door wasn’t locked. It opened easily before him, sliding slowly inward, and a familiar chill rushed out.
Wen Jianyan didn’t rush forward rashly but carefully reached out to fumble along the wall.
With a snap, the cabin lit up.
It was empty inside. The furnishings were identical to Wen Jianyan’s room, just without the cage. At least from the outside, it looked very ordinary, with nothing weird about it, as if the knocking sound last night was just a hallucination.
Wen Jianyan took a deep breath and walked in slowly.
The air was bone-chillingly cold, stinging his skin.
Wen Jianyan composed himself and began to search the room efficiently, looking for any clues that might help him escape.
But the more he searched, the more wrong it felt.
This cabin… clearly showed signs of having been “lived in.”
There were old clothes in the closet, wrinkles on the bed from use, and footprints faintly visible in the dust on the floor—one could say that, aside from an actual human, there were traces of human activity everywhere. There were even a few books scattered at the head of the bed. The text inside was strange; Wen Jianyan couldn’t read it. However, while he was flipping through a book, something fell out and hit the floor with a clang.
Wen Jianyan paused, bent down, and picked the item up.
It was a small metal plate. Perhaps due to age, the content on it was mottled, and only the first two digits were barely visible—
18.
…18?
“?!”
Wen Jianyan was stunned for a moment, then seemed to realize something, his pupils constricting sharply.
The moment he saw the number on the metal plate, he finally knew exactly which underground level of the Lucky Cruise ship he was on…
—This was actually the Negative 18th Floor!!!
